rssBest of The Streak: Maestro, Indeed
Wednesday, December 31, 2008 at 8:30 am
- 3 Comments
First appeared January 24, 2008
As the mortgage-market meltdown continues to push the Iraq War from the headlines and put sweat on the brows of Washington’s policymakers, it’s heartening to learn that some folks have done well by the economic chaos. Still, did it have to be the guy who, from Washington, helped produce the lending crisis to begin with? (Yes, it did.)
Alan Greenspan, who left his post as chairman of the Federal Reserve in January 2006, just took a consulting job with Paulson & Co., a New York-based hedge-fund manager which last year made profits estimated between $12 billion and $15 billion betting that the bottom would drop out of the housing market — a trend to which many observers say Greenspan contributed by holding interest rates artificially low during his tenure.
“Greenspan will spend the rest of his life ducking and dodging responsibility for this crisis,” said Lawrence Hunter, a Jack Kemp conservative and economist at the Texas-based Institute for Policy Innovation.
Meanwhile, the 18-year Fed chairman’s gotta pay the rent somehow. Maestro, indeed.
Now that the roller coaster that was 2008 has come to an end, we thought it would be fun to look back at some of our most popular, thought-provoking and entertaining posts from The Streak over the past year. This post was chosen by TWI staff as one of the most memorable of 2008.
3 Comments
Pingback posted December 31, 2008 @ 11:43 am
[...] As the mortgage-market meltdown continues to push the Iraq War from the headlines and put sweat on the brows of Washington
Comment posted December 31, 2008 @ 1:28 pm
Three cheers for scientists who will not be silenced by the chance at great wealth, power, privileges and status that are sure to be derived from saying loudly and clearly only what is politically convenient and economically expedient.
Why not lay blame for the current economic catastrophe and the looming environmental calamity where it belongs: at the feet of the economic powerbrokers who organize and manage a colossal pyramid scheme, a modern representation of the ancient Tower of Babel? Is the pernicious denial of anthropogenic global warming and the human-driven destabilization of Earth's climate not primarily for the purpose of preserving the selfish material interests of a few wealthy and powerful people, and their minions?
Let's look a bit more closely at the scandulous 'business' of Bernie Madoff, confidence games, Ponzi schemes and other financial vehicles for funneling, accumulating and concentrating billions of dollars in unearned wealth into the hands of a tiny minority of people who comprise the top of the global economy.
There are many minions of the wealthy and their bought-and-paid-for politicians who “spread the word” of these schemes. Con men operate pyramid schemes. They assure “plausible deniability” and “legal cover” for all that is said and done.
Only a telling of the truth about what they are doing is forbidden. That is the one and only thing that is verboten. Do not break their vow of silence by telling what is true about the perpetration of the schemes {ie, the only games in town, so they say}, because the “houses of cards” out of which a modern Tower of Babel is constructed immediately is exposed as fraudulent and patently unsustainable. These pyramidal constructions can withstand any force except that which is presented by speaking out loudly and clearly about what is happening in these enterprises. As soon as light of what is true was shed on Bernie's scheme, the house of cards he had constructed fell.
Bernard Madoff may be the first of my “Not So GREAT GREED GRAB Generation's” kingpins to find that his “house of cards” has collapsed; but I dare say, Bernie will not be the last. There are other kingpins and many too many minions ready, willing and able to play along in what looks like the greatest self-enrichment scam in human history.
Why not say that greed is not good and mean it? Why not assign value to personal honesty, accountability and transparency?
Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population,
established 2001
http://sustainabilityscience.org/content.html?c…
Comment posted January 1, 2009 @ 1:51 am
A Specific Application of Employment, Interest and Money
Abstract:
This tract makes a critical analysis of credit based, free market economy, Capitalism, and proves that its dysfunctions are the result of the existence of credit.
It shows that income / wealth disparity, cause and consequence of credit and of the level of long-term interest-rates, is the first order hidden variable, possibly the only one, of economic development.
It solves most of the puzzles of macro economy: among which Business Cycles, Stagflation, Greenspan Conundrum, Deflation and Keynes' Liquidity Trap…
It shows that no fiscal or monetary policy, including the barbaric quantitative easing will get us out of depression.
It shows that Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes, Karl Marx and Alan Greenspan don't contradict each other but that they each bring a meaningful contribution to a same framework for understanding macro economy.
It proposes a credit free, free market economy as a solution that would correct all of those dysfunctions.
In This Age of Turbulence People Want an Exit Strategy out of Credit, an Adventure in a New World Economic Order.
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